A Hundred Lines
by Heathersmoke
Summary: Some discoveries you make about yourself are best kept secret for the sake of saving face, as Severus learns, though Minerva is more understanding than he'd think.
1. Chapter 1

**A Hundred Lines**

_I must not interrupt my teacher when she is talking. I must not interrupt my teacher when she is talking. I -_

The first time Minerva caught him he felt as though hot lead had been poured into his stomach, eating him up from the inside. It stayed inside him until long after the noises of the day had settled down inside the castle, and long after he had pulled close the curtains around his bed in the Head of Slytherin's quarters. The look on her face as she was standing in the doorway had not been so much startled as curious, some mild incomprehension on her face, and yet he could not imagine the loathing and disgust she must be feeling.

Severus could not imagine why he had let it come this far. The burning shame inside him chased him out of bed and made him pace the worn wooden floor of his study in the near darkness, then guided his hand to the decanter of whiskey stored in his lower desk drawer. Shakily, he poured himself a glass. He drank half, then shook his head and poured the remaining contents of the glass into the sink, then stared at the empty eyed, tired-looking man in the mirror in front of him. What had he done!

He looked young in the mirror, young, stupid, and tired. He made a face at himself by habit and turned around, crawling into bed, where he lay, unable to sleep, heat tormenting his stomach, thoughts racing through his head, and again and again, the sight of the parchment in front of him and Minerva, her eyes widening behind her glasses, looking at him, looking at his parchment. He had to obliviate her, it was the only option. It was bad enough that he, a teacher, felt this aroused at the thought of being a student again, but that his long-time colleague and friend had seen, and worse, must have understood what he was doing there was too horrific a thought to be real.

He had been sitting at his old desk, writing, when she had come in. Lines upon lines upon lines, all in the same spidery, black-inked scrawl that she must remember from earlier years. One parchment had already lain in front of him, full of drying ink.

_I must not interrupt my teacher when she is talking. I must not interrupt my teacher when she is talking. I must no-_

When he had heard the door creak open and seen the green swish out of the corner of his eye, he had panicked. In one hasty movement he had vanished parchment, ink and quill, disentangled himself from the desk and then wordlessly left the room, striding along as fast as he could, trying to look as arrogant as possible to keep her from commenting. He had not looked around, but the quiet 'click' of the closing door to the Transfiguration classroom slapped him as he left. Images of Minerva's eyes followed him, staring at him accusingly from his memory. What had he been doing there, in her classroom? What had he been writing? Who did he think he was, becoming a teacher? He noticed that he was sweating and welcomed the cool breeze the corridors.

He avoided her for a week after that, it was not hard. Given the flexible nature of their - understanding, she did not seem to be too worried. It was not unusual for him to disappear for weeks on end after having shared her bed nearly every night before, and she had given up trying to schedule his visits – she either let him in or didn't, and he never minded being turned away. It worked. Now, all he had to do was skip lunch and take a very early breakfast and a very late supper. She did not pry, probably because she was too ashamed to have been associated with him in any way, the heated voice in his head told him.

He could not face her expression, and at the same time, curiously, the anticipation he felt at turning corners while patrolling the corridors and when entering the Great Hall, the dread that she might be there, the dread of having aroused her displeasure, gave him a jolt of unmistakable excitement, too. He wanted and did not want to meet her, kept imagining the precise moment when he would run into her, when her eyes would glare accusingly into his, lips narrowed to a thin white line, until the heat of the shame and the reproach in her eyes would become so bad that he would have to look away, look at the floor, at the laces of her boots, of which the right one was almost always slightly more worn than the left one, at the hem of her robes, at anything but at her face. Even in its absence he felt that look scorching through him, the sight of him sitting there, burning away her respect for him when she realized what he was, what he had always been.

Living in the castle, preparing his lessons, and even teaching made him feel pointedly uncomfortable the week after the incident. Any minute he felt someone would come into the classroom and drag him out, having been exposed for his nature. It made him irritable, and when a young Ravenclaw proved the Sorting Hat could well make mistakes by dropping his wand into a bubbling cauldron and setting the liquid in it on fire, he lost his temper. He hissed at the boy, took points, and gave everybody extra work – a reaction he regretted later on, as the boy had been rather young, and as the three tearstained extra inches of essay he had to slog through to get to the end of his working day were rather dull.

Minerva would not approve of this kind of reaction, either, never had.  
><em>"A teacher endeavors not to frighten his students, Severus," she had reprimanded him after his first week. "Of course young first years are easily impressed and are sometimes hard to put at ease, but you should always maintain an even temper and a tolerance for some mistakes, especially from young students. And now write this again, you cannot tell this to a second year."<em>

She had overseen his first steps, sternly looking over essays he graded and comments he wrote under his students' essays, offering help and corrections, sometimes even vanishing them entirely if she felt he had gone too far. She had not trusted him.

_"Don't believe that Albus' need for a spy is enough in the way of credentials needed for this profession," she said pointedly after he had been introduced at a staff meeting, both lagging behind – him waiting for Albus, her finishing the minutes. "You will need to make a lot more of an effort than you are making now to become a teacher, Mr. Snape. Severus."_

The witch seemed to follow his every move with a red inked quill, drawing his attention to everything he needed to do differently, needed to stop, or needed to start. She had taken to leaving notes on his plate at lunch if she wanted to see him, and he dreaded the little white pieces of parchment.

_You cannot make personal remarks on a student's blood status. See me._

_A student's shortcomings when it comes to her handwriting is not enough grounds to fail her essay entirely. As you should know from experience. Please use this clarity spell and have another look at her work._

_Using students' pets in class is encouraged to motivate students; using them to demonstrate a deadly poison, however, is not. Please write the young lady in question a letter of apology and refund her for her beloved pet toad._

When he had first taken a fumbling, drunken lunge at her one Christmas she had pushed him back, sat him down on a chair, flicked her wand to snuff out the candles and used the same clipped tones to explain to him what he needed to do if he wanted to sleep with her in the warm darkness of her living room. He could practically hear the red ink as she guided his actions.

_No, you do not ever rip my clothing, that is stuff from cheap romance novels and I'd be very much obliged if you repaired it right away – thank you very much indeed._

_Ouch! You will not bite my neck unprovoked this early on, it hurts._

_Get up, this is highly uncomfortable, the floor is rather cold._

_Keep going. Steady. Don't you dare stop!_

That was then, after several drunken- and then sober kisses around Christmas, and then during the year, and heated discussions and tangled sheets in her quarters after quidditch games and then nights spent. Now, his embarrassing secret discovered, he was here, again, in this freezing corridor, dreading her very sight. He stopped when he realized where his night-time patrol had taken him. A week after the incident, he felt as apprehensive as ever. Around every corner, she might be waiting, glaring at him, ready to throw him out, eyes filled with disgust.

It was as though she was permanently standing behind him, looking over his shoulder, scolding and reprimanding his behavior during that feverish week. Her presence in his brain had started to unsettle him, especially when he noticed the heat of his shame quietly sneaking around and filling him with a sharp tinge of desire he was hesitant to acknowledge as such. And yet, his reaction to the thought of finally being caught by her was unmistakable, and he hated himself for it.

His quiet steps led him down corridors and up stairs, his dark eyes firmly fixed on the furthest wall, staunchly avoiding the gently snoring portraits as he made his way through the sleeping castle. A distant rattle indicated house elves making their daily cleaning rounds, or possibly Peeves filling the suits of armour on the stairs with marbles. He ignored the noises and felt his steps slow down as he climbed the last stair.

He was so close to her quarters now that he could almost feel her scorn through the walls. How could he be her colleague, feeling like a student himself? How could he, still needing this kind of punishment, stand up in his classroom day after day, educating students? His face twitched into an expression of loathing at the thought of himself and he dragged his feet up the last remaining steps and entered the first door on the left.


	2. Chapter 2

The Transfiguration classroom was abandoned and quiet, only the sad smells of students' mistakes and their disastrous consequences for their test subjects still hung in the air- an acrid smoke like burning feathers. As always, the classroom was scrupulously clean – no burnt feathers in spite of the smell that had seeped into the book case, the board had been cleaned until the dull black sucked up every light and hung in front of him like a large, black pit. The desks sat abandoned, too, the polished, worn wood outlined by the little light there was, eagerly facing Minerva's desk. There was no fire, nor embers left in the hearth, and Minerva's desk was looking at him accusingly. A strange floating, tingly sensation took hold of his stomach as he stepped inside and closed the door behind him into her classroom.

Severus stood himself in front of her desk for a minute to look around, but felt uneasy at the front of the strange classroom. He felt wrong, out of place. His place was not up here, but there, in the second seat in the last row from the back. He sidled over and slid into the seat with a practiced motion that did not work as well today, now that he had to almost fold himself in half to fit. He had grown a lot. From here, the view was more familiar, and he felt something inside him slide into place and his shoulders release a tension he had not even realized was there.

He was secure. Alone in the empty classroom, drinking the silence, he summoned ink and quill, straining his ears for more noises before dipping his quill into the inkwell. The sounds there were all muffled by the closed door. He was alone, a burning in the pit of his stomach as he hastily wrote the first line.

_I must not enter the Transfiguration classroom after hours. I must not enter the Transfiguration classroom after hours._

He looked at the first two lines and frowned, acutely aware of what he must look like – the Potions teacher, clad in black robes, tall, sticking out from this desk that was too small for him, ridiculous. He moved a hand to crumple the parchment when a voice cracked through the silence like a whip.

"Don't you dare, Mr Snape. You will finish those lines. In silence."

He froze, his heart caught in his throat, afraid to even put his hand back down.

"Continue, Mr Snape," the voice said sharply.

A shudder ran down his spine and he put down his hand. He could hear his pulse thundering in his ears, his stomach and face were on so hot he was convinced he must be emitting a red glow of shame. A vein had started throbbing in his forehead and he lowered his face until it was nearly obscured by his falling hair.

The click-click of boots on stone moved over to him as he unwillingly moved dipped his quill into the inkwell. When he breathed in, he took in the scent of heather and lilies that he had come to associate with Minerva. He briefly closed his eyes, his pulse thumping.

"I do not see you writing. At least a hundred lines. You have no business being in my classroom this late."

The small cracking sound of the last "t" sent a shiver down his spine and set off a spark that twitched through his lower body, filling him with pressing heat. He quickly put his hand on the parchment again. Minerva moved to stand behind him, looking over his shoulder, he could almost feel the outline of her body by the heat radiating off her.

She exhaled, not sounding pleased.

"You will write the last line again, your handwriting is impossible to read."

A flick of her wand erased it and her boots click-clicked her way back to the teacher's desk. He peered at his parchment when torches lit up around them, one by one, and he hunched his head between his shoulders, not looking at her.

"What are you waiting for?"

"I'm writing," he mumbled.

"Speak up," she snapped.

"I'm writing, Professor," he repeated, only barely louder.

"Good."

For the next half hour, she sat at her desk, watching him, and he finished his hundred lines under her burning glare. When he was done, the Head of Slytherin put down his quill sheepishly and sat in front of his work, heat coursing through his body, too ashamed to look at her. He never dared stopping, uncertain about how to extricate himself from this situation, and, as time passed, less and less eager to get up because of the visible effects of his emotional state.

The lines grew on the parchment and turned dull as they dried in the golden light from the torches. With every line, he felt lighter, yet also more keenly aware of the time that had passed. What was she going to do? Why was she doing this?

Finally, it was done. A hundred lines. He counted them, quietly mumbling the numbers under his breath, then sat down his quill, head bowed. What now?

Minerva's shape did not move for a while after he had stopped writing. Silence stretched between them and fear crept up on him. What would she do? Then, her chair scraped over the floor, there was a rustle and again, the sounds of her heels of her boots on the stones as she came to stand next to him. She picked up his work and critically examined it.

"Good," she repeated quietly and put his lines neatly back onto his desk. "Get up, Mr Snape," she said.

He did not move.

"I said: get up."

Severus wanted to jump up, shove her aside, obliviate her while she was lying on the floor and run for it. Pack his things, leave the school, never see her again so he could not see in her face how worthless and pathetic his behaviour had been. He also wanted to press himself against her, taking in her smell, go to bed with her, feel her hands on his skin as he pressed his lips against her warm body.  
>Instead, he got up slowly, clumsily, his heart pounding, hand firmly clasping the handle of his wand, just in case.<p>

"Look at me."

"What do you want, Minerva?"

He unwillingly lifted his eyes, his expression not managing to be carefully blank. Severus glared at her in defiance. He could end this, he thought heatedly. Obliviate her, burn the paper, pour away his own memories and this weird incident would never have happened.  
>To his immense surprise, her face was not filled with loathing or disgust. She did eye him reproachfully now, though.<p>

"That is 'Professor' to you," she corrected.

"Professor," he had repeated in correction before he could stop himself. Angrily, he looked aside when he felt a light touch on his hand.

"I am glad I have found someone who… likes this." Minerva said, and her voice was unusually awkward for his eloquent colleague.

"What?"

"Although I assume it might not be quite appropriate," Minerva added sensibly, adding a gesture around the room that seemed to encompass both of them, and Hogwarts, and he understood. Her eyes followed her hand and she seemed unable to meet his gaze. "I enjoyed this. Mr Snape. Severus."

Her head turned back towards him. Blasted Gryffindor bluntness! He flushed crimson as he saw her shamefilled features, valiantly staring into his eyes. He looked at the lines for a moment before speaking again.

"I… I hope the lines were to your satisfaction, Professor?"

She took a step back from him and looked him up and down, standing next to his old desk like a schoolboy, albeit one in robes, taller than her, a teacher himself, a Head of House, damn the woman, his expression carefully blank_. This is absurd_, an inner voice told him, _you are being ridiculous_.

"They were indeed, but you will have to write a set tomorrow, because while you entered my classroom without my knowledge last week, you also entered it today to write your lines, and that won't do at all."

"Yes. Thank you, Professor."

He could not explain to himself the shudder that followed her voice and when he looked up, he saw her smile. He bent down slightly to kiss her and was surprised how warm she was, how eagerly she reciprocated his advances.

* * *

><p>Later, when they were holding on to each other vaguely sheepishly in the quiet darkness of her bedroom, she gave him an unfocused look. Her glasses were lying on the bedside table, smeared with fingerprints due to his earlier clumsy haste. When she spoke, her voice was quiet.<p>

"Severus, I noticed you were avoiding me. And I greatly enjoyed trying to catch you, and even more finding you today, but I think that this can't continue like last week in future."

Severus frowned, unwilling to concede there could be a "this". He tried to settle for a nod, but her eyes stayed firmly fixed on his. He thought for a while, reddening, then shrugged unsuccessfully, her lying on his right shoulder.

"I would very much like to do something like this again," she said, again with a bluntness that made his face burn with shame, but also flooded him with a relief he had not anticipated.

"Me, too," he mumbled barely loud enough for himself to hear, but she seemed to pick it up and exhaled with a smile.

"That is great. Still, we can't have this sort of game interfering with our working lives."

The Potions teacher sighed.

"I agree. But what should we do?"

"I think we should take care that this only occurs after hours. When you should be in your own bed, anyway, Mr Snape."

The sentence hung in the air a long time after she had said it and he did not answer. His eyes searched the shadows in the canopy above her bed for meaning, but he didn't find any. When she rested her head against his shoulder, a warm sensation of contentedness washed over him.

"Yes, Professor," he breathed into her hair.

He was good again. She had forgiven him. He had not lost points. And paradoxically, he was still her equal. She still saw him as a teacher. She had approved of his lines. She had let him bite her in a frenzied moment and inhaled sharply, which he loved. She had vanished only one of his sentences. He had relished the feeling of her naked skin on his. He had written lines for her in punishment. She had kissed him with abandon once they had entered her quarters.

When she turned and rested her head on his shoulder and let him hold her, he felt at the same time as though it was the other way round and he was resting in hers, protected, safe, at ease.

_The End_


End file.
